Guardian Media Group is looking to take a leading role in any consortium bidding to take over ITV's regional news programming in the north of England.

Mark Dodson, the chief executive of GMG's regional newspaper division, said the company was keen to take the lead in any pilot scheme to take over news provision in one of the ITV regions in the north of England.

Dodson added that a pilot would need to be run in one of ITV's English regions, possibly in addition to a similar trial in either Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, because the requirements for a consortium to provide public service news broadcasting would be significantly different in both.

He said GMG would look to forge partnerships with organisations including radio broadcasters, other newspaper groups and the Press Association.

"I think that GMG would be keen to lead a trial in the north of England on behalf of themselves and the Newspaper Society," Dodson added.

GMG, which also publishes MediaGuardian.co.uk, owns the Manchester Evening News and a string of local newspapers, along with the TV service Channel M, in the north-west, ITV's Granada region.

The other ITV news regions in the north of England are Yorkshire and Tyne Tees/Border. ITV currently produces all its regional news bulletins in-house – Granada Reports in the north-west, Calendar for Yorkshire, and North East Tonight and Lookaround for Tyne Tees and Border viewers, respectively.

But Ofcom's chief executive, Ed Richards, yesterday admitted that this ITV regional news operation, which has a rich heritage going back to the launch of the UK's first commercial network in 1955, was "unsustainable".

Dodson said that GMG did not envisage it being necessary for ITV plc, which provides locals news on ITV1 for the English regions and Wales, to be involved in the project.

"It is preferable to work with ITV but you should not be obliged. At best it should be a seamless process of them retreating from their obligations and independent news consortia taking over," he added.

Newspaper publishers had to be at the heart of any reorganisation of local media, Dodson said, adding that Richards' "robust proposal" had been welcomed by the regional press industry.

"It [Richards' idea] was the most promising thing to have come out of Ofcom for years ... it was an imaginative process that will give the government and regulator some options should ITV walk away from its obligations," he added.

Other regional publishers also welcomed the plan for greater collaboration. Tom Thomson, the managing editor of the Glasgow-based Herald & Times Group, part of Newsquest, said they had been in talks with different media groups for some time over possible partnerships. "We are happy to talk to other news organisations about the potential for cooperation," he said.

Jeremy Dear, the general secretary of the National Union of Journalists, said the union would like to find out more about these proposals for local news consortia.

"Any solutions must be about adding money to the pool used to fund quality local journalism, and we're looking forward to having further discussions with Ofcom and the secretary of state [Andy Burnham] to examine how we can secure sufficient investment in local news both now and in the future," Dear added.

All eyes will now been on Lord Carter, the communications minister, when he publishes his final Digital Britain report in the summer to see if the offers of running pilot schemes win government backing.

Richards said yesterday that urgent action was needed to find an alternative to the current ITV local news operation, saying it was time to take the idea "on to the next stage".

He estimated that £60m-£100m a year would be required to fund a non-BBC local TV news service across the UK, with the corporation's digital switchover surplus the most likely source for this money.

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